New Recipe

Tonight we had a new recipe from The Pampered Chef cookbook 29 Minutes to Dinner. It was called Brown Butter Tortellini with Spinach and Ham.

1 20-oz package refrigerated cheese-filled tortellini

1 6-oz package fresh baby spinach

1 8-oz piece cooked ham steak

1 large red bell pepper

1/4 cup butter (do not substitute margarine)

coarsely ground black pepper

1. Cook tortellini in boiling, salted water according to package directions.

2. As tortellini cooks, place spinach into a large colander. When tortellini is finished cooking, drain in colander over spinach. This will wilt the spinach without overcooking it.

Meanwhile, dice ham roughly. Finely dice red bell pepper.

3. Add butter to pot in which you boiled tortellini; heat over medium heat for 5-7 minutes or until butter is a deep brown color, stirring occasionally. Do not allow to burn. As soon as the butter is browned, add the diced red bell pepper. This will cool the butter and prevent burning. Reduce heat to low; add ham, tortellini, and spinach. Gently toss. Add black pepper to taste.

Yield: 6 servings (Okay, 6 servings of UNREAL people - Joshua was already asleep, so the four of us polished this off.)

My redneck Wal-Mart didn't have tortellini, so I substituted frozen miniature cheese-filled ravioli. This was a noted substitution in the book - they also said you could substitute diced, cooked chicken for the ham. That would be a good way to use up left over chicken.

I really liked this dish. Morgan didn't because she doesn't like ravioli. That said, she ate quite a bit. Steve said it needed "sauce." Men!